William Blake called the English language "the rough basement". That has always appealed to me; I imagine a cottage cellar hewn from dark well packed earth, smelling of life.

I have the good fortune to know several native speakers of other languages who are ardent Anglophiles: one is Paraguayan, one a Swiss German, and one is Japanese. They all say the same things about English.

It's very musical. A sentence can be a song. It needs to be spoken slowly; it has a natural rhythm that warrants being let to take its own time to develop.

It isn't always logical, but there is something comfortable and commonsensical about it. It isn't always precise, but if you are willing to dig long enough for the right word, you can achieve a finesse of nuance not possible in other tongues.

It isn't always straightforward, but it is full of curios and knick knacks that make up in charm and surprise what they lack in elegance.